Asulam - some good news

A summary of the outcomes from a meeting held between representatives of the bracken control industry and UPL can be found on the Heather Trust's Blog.

Asulam for Bracken control - the appeal fails

For information about this, see the post on The Heather Trust's Blog.

It is a major issue for Scotland as well as other areas of the UK with large areas of bracken cover.

Langholm Moor Demonstration Project

Wildlife Extra.com has published an article summarises the 3 year review of the project and provides a useful summary of progress.

Meet the Minister at Glensaugh

Lord Lindsay and Prof Iain Gordon, Chief Executive of the James Hutton Institute, jointly hosted a meeting at the Glensaugh Research Station for Stewart Stevenson, MSP, the Minister for Environment and Climate Change.  This gave representatives of both organisations a chance to discuss upland issues with the Minister in an informal, practical setting.  The weather was fair and some interesting discussion too place.  The JHI communications team issued a press release which can be viewed here and the Press & Journal published a short article which can be downloaded here.

This was a good chance to impress on the Minister the role that the Forum has in generating consensus.  It linked well to the JHI message about the need for partnership and engagement with the end users of the science.  The proposal to establish an annual research exchange meeting at Glensaugh received all round support and the aim will be to set this up as soon as possible.

Upland Solutions

The final versions of the three reports produced by the project are now available on the Forum's website.  This project is an important output from the Forum.

The press release issued to announce the publication of the final report is also available from the website and this resulted in an article in the Press & Journal on 23 August 2011, which again can be viewed from the website.

The project and the report have highlighted many issues and the Forum will be considering these to see how the lessons learned can be applied in the future.

Peatlands and the 2020 Climate Group

Building on a briefing I prepared for the Forum, I wrote an article for Scotland's 2020 Climate Group that has now been published on the group's website.

Muirburn Licensing

The licensing scheme introduced by the Wildlife & Natural Environment (Scotland) Act 2011 is now live and the guidance and application form can be downloaded from the SNH website.

Other muirburn provisions introduced by the Act are likely to be implemented prior to the start of the Muirburn Season on 1 October.   The Forum's muirburn group will be assisting the Scottish Government with the preparation of additional guidance about these issues - mainly changes to the season to remove the extension above 450m to 15 May, and changes to the neighbour notification requirements.